Feds bust tunnel under U.S.-Canadian border

By GENE JOHNSON
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

SEATTLE -- Federal agents have shut down a drug-smuggling tunnel built under the U.S.-Canadian border north of Lynden, Wash., federal officials said Thursday.

Authorities had been monitoring construction of the tunnel for eight months and sealed it shortly after it opened Wednesday, making three to five arrests in the process, a government employee who had been briefed by local law enforcement officials told The Associated Press.

The source spoke Wednesday on the condition of anonymity because the news had not been made public.

A news release Thursday morning from U.S. Attorney John McKay confirmed the tunnel, calling it the first tunnel found on the northern border of the United States. A news conference was scheduled for late morning allowing reporters access to the tunnel on the Canadian side.

No other details were provided in the release.

The exact length of the tunnel was not known. It ran from a greenhouse on the Canadian side to within about 100 yards of an abandoned house on the U.S. side, 300 feet from the border, the source said.

Ruthie Steinfort, who lives across the street from the abandoned house, told The Seattle Times that federal agents stopped her when she tried to drive home Wednesday. She said three people were arrested in the abandoned home and Border Patrol agents confirmed the arrests.

"It blows me away," said Steinfort. "We're right next to the border station."

Steinfort said her neighborhood, about a two-minute walk from the border, is constantly busy with agents searching for people trying to cross into the country illegally.

Emily Langlie, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in Seattle, declined to comment, as did Michael Milne, a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The source said the investigation was handled largely by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI, but FBI agent Roberta A. Burroughs in Seattle said it was "another federal agency's investigation."

Steinfort said she never heard any noise from the rundown property during the period when sources said the tunnel was being built. She said she thought an Eastern Washington couple purchased the property about two years ago but never saw anyone on the site.

"They never mow the lawn and everything is deteriorating over there," she said.

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